Nanban review: "Worthy & impressive remake!!!"

We are into the second week of 2012 & the Tamilians are gearing up for their harvest festival, Pongal which is one of the biggest festivals of the year. As always, Kollywood has lined up interesting big budget projects, with Shankar's "Nanban", remake of the blockbuster "3 Idiots" being the most anticipated. With Vijay & Shankar joining hands for the first time, can the hitmaker add yet another one into his kitty & extend Vijay's purple patch???  Hmm..the omens seems promising!!!

Rajkumar Hirani's "3 Idiots" is the biggest ever blockbuster of Bollywood, so remaking it in any language would generate a great deal of interest. When Shankar, the man with the Midas touch expressed his interest to remake it with Vijay in the lead, the expectations naturally went through the roof. Anyway, here's a brief preview though I am sure almost all of you guys would have watched the original. Panchavan Parivendran (Vijay), Sevalkodi Senthil (Jeeva) & Venkatramakrishnan (Srikanth) are room mates in Ideal Engineering College which is being headed by Virumandi Santhanam alias Virus (Satyaraj). Senthil always succumbs to pressure while Venkat's is forced to forego his passion for photography to fulfill his father's wishes. Pari is one who believes in following the heart & instills the same in his friends. Pari's unorthodox take on education & brilliance had made him rub shoulders with Virus & his colleague, Silencer (Satyan) in the wrong way. All this & more, forms the framework of this flick.

After Shankar's blockbuster "Enthiran", the announcement of "Nanban" sparked an unprecedented hype considering the star ensemble that he had lined up & also the huge risk on how to improve on a blockbuster like "3 Idiots". But it wouldnt be prudent to declare now that Shankar has done a fantastic job. He has remained faithful to the original & thankfully, didnt include any unnecessary heroism which is part & parcel of Vijay's films. However, the music by Haris Jayaraj contrary to expectations was quite a dampener while Antony could have done much better with the editing as it runs close to 3 hours.

If the script was the heart of the original, then the brilliant star cast was the soul. Keeping this in mind, Shankar has carefully selected the cast. Vijay was outstanding to say the least devoid of his starry airs & heroism, reminding us of his hits as adorable characters in the 90s. Though I was quite apprehensive as to how Srikanth might perform, he put my doubts to rest with a good performance along with an impressive Jeeva. Ileana & Sathyan however failed to capture the magic of Kareena & Omi Vidya respectively. Satyaraj has definitely done a decent job but falters with respect to Boman's brilliance.

Verdict: The film will take an outstanding opening & it will remain so for a fortnight or more as it's really well made. It might not excite the hard core fans of the original, but I certainly believe this does deserve more than a look into. In short, it's a superhit in the making; so check it out!!!

Rating: 3.25/5

Regards...Ben